


tell me tell me nothing's wrong

by Mellow_Yellow



Category: Pod Save America (RPF)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex, F/F, Pining, cis girl Dan, cis girl Lovett
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-15
Updated: 2017-08-15
Packaged: 2018-12-15 14:34:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11807928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mellow_Yellow/pseuds/Mellow_Yellow
Summary: I stand on the shoulders of noted geniuses @podsavemysoul and @baking-soda who brought usgirl!dan. EVERYBODY BE COOL AND NEVER SPEAK OF THIS TO ANYONE.





	tell me tell me nothing's wrong

**Author's Note:**

> you're welcome in advance for this excruciatingly specific trope & pairing that will appeal to maybe 3 people in this already incredibly niche fandom. 
> 
> title from Haim.

*

 

“Go talk to her,” Tommy said, nudging Lovett in the side until she half-twisted off her stool to avoid his bony elbow.

“Stop it,” Lovett snapped, elbowing him back. “Don’t push me.”

Ignoring her, Tommy nudged her again, jerking his chin in the direction of the supposedly hot girl situated at some mysterious set of coordinates across from them near the bar. “She’s hot, and she’s looking at you.” 

Lovett rolled her eyes. “You think every femme gay girl is hot.” It was pretty annoying and gave the sharp note in her voice a real edge. “Leave me alone. I just want to drink this overpriced drink in peace.”

She could tell Tommy was ready to keep bugging her about it, which Lovett was dreading, because what she really wanted was all of Tommy's attention, like always. She was only here for the weekend, and she didn't want to waste any of that scant time flirting with some stranger, not when Tommy was right here, smiling down at her. The only way it would be better was if she had Favs' attention too, but she could settle for Tommy.

Just then, Tommy waved his arm over his head toward someone by the door. “Dan!” he called out, grinning. “Dan, over here, hey!”

“Wait, _Dan_?” Lovett whined, reflexive, making a face. She didn’t know Dan was coming.

“Be nice, Lovett,” Tommy said sternly. “Don’t be a dick.”

“I’m never a dick.” She took a deep sip of her drink, ignoring Tommy’s pointed glare. “Shut up.”

But she sighed, trying to be an adult. Tommy was right. Dan was nice. Just because Dan was also incredibly, Olympic-level boring didn’t mean Lovett couldn’t rise above and try to fight against her natural inclination to be a pill for one night.

Lovett could see Dan making her way toward them, looking slightly harried as she stepped around crowds of people, her long dark hair pulled into a messy knot on her head. She had bangs now, Lovett saw, and was trying to pick between one of a half dozen jokes when she saw, as Dan got closer, that it actually didn’t look so bad. It had that kind of silky, messy hipster Zooey Deschanel quality that most people could only capture through precise, artful styling. She was nearly a thousand percent positive Dan achieved it through sheer carelessness.

“Hi,” Dan said breathlessly when she finally reached them, collapsing onto the stool next to Tommy with a huff. She set her enormous red shoulder bag against the wall, swinging her legs under the tall bar table. “Sorry I’m late, the meeting ran late, and then I had to finish up like nine dumb things, I’m so sorry—” 

Tommy cut her off, gently. “Dan, it’s cool.” He held up a hand for their waitress. “What do you want to drink?”

“Wine,” Dan said, so immediately that Lovett snorted. Some things didn’t change.

The sound made Dan turn fully, eyes seeming to catch on Lovett for the first time. Her eyebrows went up. “Lovett,” she said. She swallowed, making a slightly hilarious strangled sound. “I didn’t—um, see you. Hey! I didn’t know you were in town.”

“Really? I thought Tommy told you. I’m here for the weekend.” 

Dan smiled at her, mouth stretching wide across her teeth. “Cool! That’s awesome.”

A couple of years ago, Lovett would grimace internally, agitated despite herself at Dan’s relentless dorkiness, and feeling like an asshole for being bothered by it. 

Now, she found herself smiling back. Dan looked well rested. Not tan, because Lovett doubted Dan had the ability to tan, but the lines around her eyes seemed more like laugh-lines and less like exhaustion scars. Seeing people post-White House was like the pre-alien reveal in the movie Cocoon, when a bunch of old zombies suddenly got all their energy back for a brief period. 

Tommy ordered Dan a glass of wine after Dan specified a type, and then she and Tommy had an inane back and forth about types of wine that only went on for probably two minutes but felt like an eternity to Lovett.

“Okay!” she cut in sharply. “Stop! No more wine talk. We’re all dying, everyone’s dying, let’s not waste it talking about fucking wine.” 

She grinned as Tommy laughed, Dan shaking her head and giggling as well. Lovett had the feeling they were humoring her, but she would take it. Her vodka-redbull was going down smooth and she was on her third and she was ready to be the center of attention.

“How’s Hollywood treating you?” Dan asked, taking a deep gulp of her white wine. She sighed after she swallowed, gazing happily at her glass. “Damn. Wine, I missed you.”

Startled, Lovett huffed out a laugh. Dan looked surprised but pleased, a light blush running across the bridge of her nose. 

“Hollywood is okay,” Lovett said, shaking her head. “I mean, it’s fine. Like, I’m not a comedic genius as it turns out and my show got fucking cancelled halfway through its first season and I haven’t written anything worthwhile in seven million years and probably any previous success I’ve enjoyed was a fluke that I’ll never be able to replicate, but other than that it’s good.” She shrugged, kicking her feet against her stool.

Tommy was chuckling, used to this rant. Dan was watching her more carefully.

“Everyone’s really tall,” Lovett offered after a pause, searching for something positive t report. That was true, at least. She was always short, but she didn’t always feel quite as obsessively aware of how short she was until she was walking around West Hollywood.

“Well, being tall is overrated,” Dan said agreeably.

“Fucking tall-ass liar,” Lovett shot back.

Dan laughed again. “You’re right, being tall is the best. I was just trying not to pile on, what with your crisis of creative confidence and everything.”

“Lovett is _all_ confidence,” Tommy said jovially. He squeezed Lovett’s shoulder comfortingly, big warm hand wrapping around it easily. “This is like, a small speed bump. You’ll bounce back in no time, buddy.”

She leaned into him, sighing. “Yeah, totally. Right on the verge of a comeback.”

“That, or you peaked in your twenties,” Dan offered. Lovett looked at her sharply and watched Dan grin easily. Teasingly, unfamiliar but oddly nice. “I mean, it's either-or.” 

“Fuck you,” Lovett said, laughing.

Dan took another sip of her wine. “The biting wit of a sketch comedian, it sizzles.” Surprising another bark of laughter out of Lovett. What was happening. Who was this. Where was Boring Dan. Lovett had no idea.

She had all these vivid memories from DC of visiting Tommy in the lower press office, sitting on his desk, pestering him until Tommy would throw his head back, face red, laughing, and Lovett would beam back at him, elated to make him break. 

Much less vividly, Lovett could remember Dan sitting on the edge of most of those conversations, a constant, blurry presence. 

She was usually smiling and listening in as Lovett both gently and not-so-gently terrorized Tommy in these memories. Sometimes Dan would pipe up with a joke, something gentle and easy, rarely enough to make Lovett throw her head back and guffaw, never such that she would to think to truly categorize Dan as funny, per se. If pressed. 

But Dan had become funny, somehow, in the few years since Lovett had seen her last. Or maybe Lovett was just noticing it, Tommy egging Dan on until she was complaining freely about her obscenely high-paying director position at some mumble-mumble company Lovett kept forgetting the name of, laying down some respectable burns about people Lovett had never heard of that made Lovett snort as she listened, head cupped in one hand, chewing on the straw of her drink. 

It even made her less maniacally aware of Tommy than she would be normally, going for long moments when she didn’t feel hyper vigilant about his knee pressed to hers, the feel of him leaning into her.

Plus, Dan thought she was funny, which Lovett loved and also meant she had two people to rant at, drinking in their attention, their laughter, Dan’s louder than Tommy’s, surprisingly, her face going progressively pinker by the time she got to the bottom of her glass of wine. 

Lovett was listening to Dan tell some meandering monotone story about the annoying board members of her high-powered tech whatever job, laughing despite herself at the way Dan kept rolling her eyes, painfully exasperated.

She didn’t notice that Tommy hadn’t come back with her drink until she blinked and maybe ten minutes had passed. She craned her neck toward the bar, trying to spot him, lethargically annoyed. She was already four drinks in, maybe she didn’t need another one right this second, but still.

When she caught sight of his familiar, sandy-haired head, she frowned. He was talking to someone. As she watched he threw his head back to laugh, cheeks pink. The movement revealed the person he was talking to—some thin, dark-haired girl, grinning easily up at him. She was pretty hot, really. It was always kind of a bummer that Lovett and Tommy had the same taste in girls. It felt unfair on some sort of cosmic level.

She knew she was staring but wasn’t aware of how bad until she heard Dan observe evenly, “Tommy’s kind of a slut these days." Her tone was nonjudgmental but it made the hair on the back of Lovett’s neck stand up anyway. 

“We tend to frown on slut-shaming nowadays,” Lovett said archly, deliberately turning her gaze from Tommy’s tall shoulders where he was hovering near some skinny, dark-haired girl at the bar. “I don’t know how people dated when you were a kid, but just a tip.”

“How much older than you do you think I am?” Dan asked. She sounded bewildered. 

“Um.” There was no good answer here. ‘I never really thought about it before?’ felt just as mean as ‘a lot older, frankly.’ So Lovett kept silent. 

“Five years, is what I assume you were about to say,” Dan supplied coolly, eyes narrowed.

“Actually, three, but five sounds right,” Lovett chirped, smiling winningly.

Dan rolled her eyes again, good-natured as always. She nodded in Tommy’s directions. “I’m just saying, don’t take it personally, it’s like he can’t help himself since he moved. He’s been like an Amish kid on rumspringa. Being single again makes his brain boil.” 

“He can fuck who he wants, he doesn’t have to babysit me,” Lovett argued. She glanced back at Tommy again. He was leaning in to say something, making the girl laugh. Probably grinning charmingly at her, bashful, flushing. What an asshole. 

“Yeah, but you’re visiting from out of town.”

Lovett shook her head, annoyed. “Well, the drive to propagate the boat-shoe line must be a powerful biological urge,” she said flatly. “Who am I to stand in the way of two nice straights finding true love? Their people have suffered so much already.” She made an exaggerated shrug at Dan.

She watched a reluctant grin creep across Dan’s face. Dan shook her head, rueful, drinking the last of her wine and twisting around in her seat to look for the waitress, her cardigan pulling tight across her chest.

Dan had really nice boobs. Lovett felt herself start as soon as the thought moseyed its way across her mind. It wasn’t—she liked boobs, it didn’t have to be weird for her to notice Dan’s boobs. She just had never thought of them before, and now she couldn’t stop staring.

When she heard a throat clear, she jerked her gaze up to find Dan peering down at her, brow furrowed.

“Are you okay?” she asked. “You keep drifting. Did you get in late last night?”

“I’m fine. Everything’s fine.” Lovett’s voice sounded croaky. Everything _was fine_ , she just needed to get a fucking grip and stop staring at _Danielle Pfeiffer’s_ goddamn rack, christ.

She sucked distractedly at the ice in her glass, ignoring Dan's startlingly nice tits, and the specter of Tommy flirting behind her by the bar.

It mostly didn’t suck as much as it used to, watching Tommy pull at the bar. It definitely still sucked, like no question, it _sucked_ , but Lovett was mostly able to ignore the dull throb in her chest now, thinking of Tommy chuckling, bending his head to speak quietly into another girl’s ear. It was fine because it had to be fine.

“My guest room’s open,” Dan said quietly.

Lovett looked at her, ready to snap that she didn’t need anyone’s fucking pity, but then she saw that Dan didn’t look like she pitied Lovett. She just looked patient. Kind, really. It was annoying, but not as annoying as the pity would have been, so.

“Fine, whatever,” Lovett said. The last thing she wanted to do was go back to Tommy’s and pretend like she didn’t hear him having sex in the next room like they were back in the apartment in DC. Or even worse, for Tommy to apologetically make some excuse to the cute girl smiling up at him and stoically go home with Lovett, insisting it wasn’t a big deal, he didn’t even want to hook up tonight anyway, clearly lying for Lovett’s benefit.

She nodded and they got off their bar stools. “I’ve got it,” Dan said, pulling out a credit card.

“I have a job, I can buy my own drinks,” Lovett snapped. She threw down a twenty on the table brattily, but she couldn’t help it.

Dan rolled her eyes yet again, comfortingly exasperated, and got the bill from the waitress, paying with her card and stuffing Lovett's money into her purse. Lovett smiled, smug, as Dan made a face.

They made their way outside, Lovett shoving her way through the crowd, texting Tommy where she was going with one hand. She hoped he frowned when he read it and felt wretchedly guilty about ditching her during her one weekend up to visit.

Dan had driven, because of course she had, but she was parked several blocks away so they had a walk ahead of them. 

"You still dealing with that thing with Tommy?" Dan asked after they'd gone for a bit, Lovett brooding silently. 

She should huff, protest, but she also wasn't surprised. Dan had been there in DC. She's wasn't stupid. She had eyes. Lovett wouldn't be surprised if everyone knew. Even Favs had caught on after a while, and he was a beautful oblivious idiot.

“It’s not a big deal." She sighed loudly. "I can’t believe I’m not over it by now, how embarrassing.” 

Dan nodded. “Tell me about it.”

Lovett looked at her quizzically, wondering who was The One That Got Away for reliable, sensible Danielle. She couldn’t even imagine. 

The cool air was sinking quickly through Lovett's t-shirt, stealing the warm buzz that was still beating at her skull, making things feel floaty and unreal.

“San Francisco is everything obnoxious about LA, only colder,” she declared, sticking her hands in her pockets, chilly. 

“You want my coat?” Dan asked, pulling a sensible slicker out of her shoulder bag like the mom she was.

“No, I want to be cold and complain about it,” she grumbled, even as she held out her hand. “Fine.”

She yanked Dan's coat around her shoulders, grudgingly admitting to herself that it was nice not to be so cold. The coat smelled slightly stale and also like Dan's deodorant. Lovett breathed it in, trying ot decide if she liked it. Maybe. 

Lovett forced herself to put thoughts of Tommy from her mind. This whole trip had been dumb, and a perfect example of Lovett's ability to delude herself into thinking impossible things were possible.

Dan kept glancing at her, until Lovett coudn't quite ignore it. It was soothing to be the center of someone's attention, at least.

“Maybe I should just stick with girls," she mused after they'd gone another block. "Guys are the worst anyway.”

“They really, really are,” Dan agreed easily. “I’m off men, probably forever.”

“Well, don’t get too excited. Being gay is annoying in its own way.”

“Tell me about it,” Dan said, just as easily. 

Lovett whipped her head around. “Wait.” 

Dan shrugged. “It’s not like I’m less bad at dating, whether it's men or women, so it doesn’t really matter.” 

“No way are you gay. You were married.” Lovett had vague memories of Dan getting a divorce during the first six months or so when Lovett started working at the White House. Some weird asshole who worked at State. Lovett had walked by a break room one night and heard Dan on the phone arguing with him, voice hoarse and upset, the whole thing painful and intimate even from the doorway. Lovett had scuttled away, feeling guilty for overhearing.

“Bi people don’t get married?” Dan said, raising an eyebrow. She was blushing, though, belying her attempt to be cool. Dan was not cool. Lovett knew that for fucking certain. 

“Whatever, I don’t believe you.”

Dan looked up at the sky, sighing. “I wasn’t late tonight because of a meeting. I went on a date. Earlier.” At first, she sounded defiant, looking over Lovett like she was daring her to argue. Lovett felt a little bad. It wasn’t like the bi thing was too much of a surprise. Dan wore New Balance sneakers with her skirt suits at the White House in between press conferences. It wasn’t the straightest look Lovett had ever seen in her life. 

Gamely, Lovett asked, “So? How was it? Meet some hip vegan startup founder with a bunch of golden retrievers and an undercut?”

Dan chuckled. “She did work at a startup, but I don’t know why—it seemed like maybe we’d have something in common? But it was.” She seemed to cut herself off, sighing broodily. “Well. It was a good reminder that most relationships are more trouble than they’re worth, so you might as well cut them off early.” 

Lovett listened, waiting, seeing the resigned look on Dan’s face and just feeling this impending sense of doom.

Dan shrugged. “She was kind of mean," she said like she was admitting something embarrassing. She pulled her dumb cardigan closed, crossing her arms over her chest. “Or I don’t know, I think I was kind of boring, and it made her kind of rude in response.” 

“Hey,” Lovett protested, with some remorse. Dan might be boring but she was also kind, and a good person. She used to keep Lovett’s favorite type of chocolate-covered pretzels in her desk whenever Lovett came to bother Tommy, for no good reason that Lovett could see because Dan hated chocolate, the weirdo. Sometimes she even had diet coke in the mini-fridge under her desk, which she shared easily with Lovett. “You’re not boring.”

Or if she was, it wasn’t some shitty date’s right to call Dan boring. Only Dan’s friends could call her that. Of which Lovett was one, apparently, somehow.

Dan didn’t seem too bothered. “It’s not a big deal. Online dating is hell. Sometimes I just need a reminder that spinsterhood is my destiny and that’s okay.”

There was a crowd at the corner and as they stepped off the curb when the walk sign lit up, Lovett weaved and nearly got swallowed up by a trio of tall bros talking loudly about something stupid.

“Careful,” Dan said, putting her hand on Lovett’s back, low, probably unintentionally so, and guided her back to safety. Lovett went alert, like a dog hearing a knock at the door. It took effort not to push back into the pressure.

It felt like if she just leaned a little, Dan might knead into the constant, low-key ache in the muscles at the base of her spine.

Of course, Dan noticed. They reached the other sidewalk as she said, “Is your back still hurting you?” She pressed her knuckles in and Lovett sucked in a breath, startled by the bolt of heat it sent up between her shoulders.

“Jesus,” she breathed out. She couldn’t help but arch into it, just a little bit.

Obligingly, Dan pressed a little harder. “You were always complaining about your back before.”

How did Dan remember that, Lovett wanted to know. Lovett complained about a lot of stuff, stuff way more important than stubborn lower back pain. 

“It’s not as bad as it was,” she mumbled, as Dan nudged her fingers into the tense muscles, just hard enough. 

“Thought you’d grow out of it now that you technically don’t have to sit at a desk all day.”

In the old days, Lovett would roll her eyes. Call Dan a mom.

But right now she was a little drunk, walking around Cold Not-LA on a relatively calm, pretty night, and Dan didn’t feel like her mom.

They passed an alley and Lovett tripped a little over some crack in the sidewalk but mostly because she was buzzed. Dan caught her before she could stumble, looping an arm around her waist and hauling Lovett up.

“Careful,” she said again, voice still warm. Arm warm around Lovett’s waist.

Lovett looked up at her, suddenly almost too warm, and mildly confused. Feeling drunker than she had a moment ago. Dan stared down at her for a beat, eyes wary.

All at once Dan pulled away, letting Lovett go so fast she swayed. She took a step back, eyes slanting away.

“You should go back with Tommy, if you want,” Dan said hurriedly, turning away. Like she was embarrassed, of what Lovett had no idea. “I know you’d rather—maybe he didn't take that girl back. You don’t have to stay with me.”

“God, stop talking about Tommy,” Lovett snapped.

She didn't want to think about Tommy anymore. She wasn't sure she wanted to be here with Dan either, who was so nice, so concerned. Too nice for Lovett. 

They were poised at the mouth of some grungy alley, she saw. Hazy inspiration struck.

Drunk and acting on instinct, she shoved Dan by the shoulders, making her stumble backward.

“What—Lovett,” Dan gasped out, startled. Lovett pushed her again, feeling mean and shaky. 

Dan was bigger than her, she could easily wrap an arm around her and lift her off her feet like Tommy or Favs did when she was getting annoying, but she didn’t. She was staring down at Lovett, letting Lovett bully her into walking backward, deeper into the alley. Awkward, fumbling in the dark, but not fighting back until finally they were in the shadows, back where it smelled wet and kind of like trash, but far away from the light of the sidewalk.

“I’m sorry I said anything about Tommy,” Dan was saying. “I shouldn’t pry—” 

“Fucking shut up.”

Lovett grabbed Dan hard by the sides, pressing sharply into her soft waist until Dan grunted as her back hit the wall. Lovett shoved up on her tiptoes to kiss her as hard as she could manage with the height difference.

Dan made a sound in her throat, not pulling away, but not moving into the kiss either.

Annoyed, Lovett licked at her, trying to get her to do something. Dan tasted like wine. Lovett wasn’t normally into wine, but she liked it right now, licking into Dan’s mouth.

Slowly, Lovett became aware that Dan was clutching her back, holding her just as tight, hurting a little where her nails dug into Lovett’s back. Desperate with it. For Lovett, at least right now, some smug part of her brain noted.

She brought her hand up and palmed roughly at Dan’s chest, cupping her left breast carelessly, marveling at the heft of it. Nearly twice the size of Lovett's tiny tits. She couldn't help but squeeze, probably too hard, like a man would do it, but Dan just made a strangled noise into Lovett’s mouth, panting, straining into Lovett’s hand. 

She boxed Dan in, smaller and shorter but still pressing Dan as hard as she could into the brick wall, loving the way Dan just let Lovett move her around, press her knee between Dan’s legs, draw it up to rub hard at the crotch of Dan’s sensible gray slacks.

Dan made an “ah,” sound, neck arching, dragging her mouth from Lovett’s. Lovett took the opportunity, nipping at her neck where Dan was starting to sweat.

Still in slight disbelief that this was actually happening, Lovett kept kissing at Dan's neck and slipped her other hand under Dan’s sweater at the same time, snaking it beneath her t-shirt and running the palm of her hand up Dan's soft waist, her rib cage, Dan’s skin tender and hidden and never something Lovett would ever have imagined touching. 

“Lovett,” Dan whispered. “We can’t, we’re outside—”

Making an angry sound, Lovett pushed up on her toes and bit at Dan's lower lip, worrying it between her teeth as she cupped Dan’s breast through her bra, one of those heavy-duty versions with four hooks in the back that were probably stress-tested on watermelons, firmly holding up Dan’s weighty tits as Lovett pawed at them, her other hand creeping around to the band in the back.

“Ah,” Dan said again, voice going high. She arched her back, not quite moving away from Lovett’s fingers as they pulled at the fastenings. “Lovett—” she bit out, warningly, but Lovett already had it open. The bra went loose, tenting over Dan’s chest, and Lovett kissed at her neck to keep her from twitching away. She brought both hands around and under the bra cups to touch Dan’s bare skin. Making Dan shiver. She felt so hot; Lovett imagined she was probably flushed, maybe a little splotchy from it across her chest.

She flicked her thumbs over the nipples, making them go stiff. She took one between her thumb and forefinger and twisted, not very gently, using the edge of her thumbnail a little until she knew it probably hurt, just that edge of pain. 

Dan sounded like she was falling apart, writhing against Lovett’s knee, legs braced wide so she could get low enough to ride it, her pussy hot enough for Lovett to feel the heat and growing wet through the fabric of both of their pants. 

Lovett wanted to get her hand in there. 

Keeping one palm firmly where it was so she wouldn’t have to completely let go of Dan’s frankly amazing breasts, she brought her hand down to hoist Dan up a little so her thigh was at Lovett’s hip. Going for the sensible slacks, Lovett flicked open the button, scrabbling for the zipper. Slipped her hand in, just getting it under the waistband of Dan’s undoubtedly practical underwear, when Dan’s hand shot down to grab Lovett’s wrist, stopping her.

“Wait.” 

She was staring down at Lovett, shocked-looking, brown eyes luminous. Her mouth was open, pink tongue visible in the yellow streetlight. She was nothing like any girl Lovett had ever gone for before, not willowy or sharp-angled or sharp-tongued, not exciting or out of Lovett's league, or even casually emotionally withholding. Everything she was feeling was right on Dan's face. Just Dan, staring down at Lovett. Waiting to see if Lovett would stop, or keep going. Not seeming sure which she preferred. 

She could feel the brush of hair against her fingertips inside Dan's pants, could almost feel the warm wet of what Dan’s pussy would be like against her knuckles

“Fuck, I want to taste you,” she muttered into the side of Dan’s neck. It was pretty tame dirty talk, in Lovett’s opinion, but it made Dan moan, loud, nearly echoing in the alleyway. 

But Dan’s hand was still holding her wrist, firmly. Firm enough that Lovett took a deep breath and drew back, looking up, her senses coming back, a trickle of awareness and subsequent unease making itself known.

Dan’s face was red. “I don’t, um.” She licked her lips, red and wet and drawing all of Lovett’s attention at the moment. She watched as Dan used her free hand to tuck her hair behind her ear, the movement making her look unusually young. “I don’t think we should do this here.”

Her turned-on idiot brain attaching to the 'here' qualified with a single-minded ferocity that made Lovett's cunt throb, she pulled away enough to cough into her elbow. Yeah. They were still in the alley. She tried to clear her head. People were walking by on the sidewalk, they could turn their heads and look in at any time, see Lovett’s short form desperately trying to get Dan off, Dan taller and bulkier and shivering beneath Lovett's mauling hands.

Dan was shaking her head. “You’re—Tommy and Favs, they’re—you don’t want me.”

"You don't know what I want," she spat out, stubbornly.

Even though until literally a half hour ago, Lovett would have unreservedly agreed with Dan. She still wasn’t sure what had changed, if anything. All she knew was she wasn’t thinking about Tommy going down on some skinny dark-haired stranger at his apartment, not when she was pressed against Dan, their chests rising and falling against each other, Dan’s bra bulky and in the way, her nipples still hard and poking against her cardigan. Dan still pressed down against Lovett’s thigh, notch between her thick, taut thighs hot and damp and perfectly distracting on Lovett's leg.

Lovett knew with an almost fatal certainty that she'd do anything to make sure the night didn't end with her falling asleep alone on Tommy's pullout couch.

She opened her mouth to argue more with Dan, to say that sure, Lovett wanted her. She did, at least right now. But she couldn't go with that outright, probably.

“Want to introduce me to your cat?” she ended up blurting instead. She didn't know if Dan had told her about a cat, but it seemed like a safe bet. 

Sure enough, a tentative smile stretched across Dan’s face, unsteady, hopeful. Painful to look at.

“Yeah?” Dan asked. 

Lovett bit her lip, a strange wave of misgiving washing over her. Like she was missing something important, through the haze of booze and residual heat between her thighs, watching Dan. Being looked at by her. It was frightening, being looked at like that. Bright and open and almost—adoring, but then, Tommy and Favs looked at her like that sometimes and it wasn’t the same—she felt powerful, here. Powerful in a frightening way. Like she shouldn't be trusted with it. Whatever it was.

But Lovett still shrugged. “Sure. Let’s do it.” She didn’t really give a shit about the cat but she did think she had a halfway decent chance of getting laid if they went back to Dan’s place. And she really wanted to fuck Dan, as mind-boggling as that development was. Pushing back her disquiet, she focused on the end game. Think like a man, she lectured herself. 

Making a face, Dan turned her back so she could bend and wrestle her bra back into submission, Lovett mostly ineffective except for helping to tug Dan’s shirt back down to cover the strangely vulnerable curve of her back. She watched as Dan zipped up her dumb high-waist work pants, and caught the way her hands shook a little as she smoothed down her clothes when she turned around. 

“Um. My car’s just—” she gestured vaguely, back toward the sidewalk, taking a few awkward steps back. 

“Lead the way,” Lovett said magnanimously, following her out.

Back on the sidewalk, Lovett started to feel more than a little guilty for trying to fuck Dan against the wall in the middle of a semi-crowded city block. Even if Dan looked quietly thrilled about it, glancing back at Lovett again and again as they wandered out to the lights of the sidewalk once more. 

Dan’s hand twitched like she was going to hold Lovett’s hand or some other similarly tender gesture Lovett felt fundamentally unprepared for. 

Before Dan could follow through, Lovett reached to shove her hand into Dan’s back pocket, grabbing hold of her ass, just as lush and substantial as her chest. Dan jolted, shuddering out a laugh.

Some strange light was in Dan’s eye as she looked down at Lovett, her color still high. Lovett wondered how close she’d been to coming. Probably close. She wanted to see what her face would do, if it would go bright red, if Dan would scream. Lovett wanted to make her loud.

Just then, Dan opened her mouth, like she was about to say something too big for this moment. It made Lovett skittish.

Lovett leered up at her, intentionally breaking the moment. 

“Hurry up, Pfeiffer, I want to get my hands on those tits again,” she said, too loudly for a sidewalk, bumping Dan with her hip. Smirking as Dan tilted slightly, letting Lovett push her around.

“Okay,” Dan said, happily, easy as anything.

Lovett inhaled, held it. This was fine. They'd finally reached Dan's car, a sensible hybrid. She ignored the way Dan held the door for her but also didn’t make fun of her for it, which felt mature. 

She watched Dan hurry around to the driver’s side, glancing in to grin at Lovett as she went. Eyes bright.

Lovett exhaled slowly. This was all going to be fine.

 

*

**Author's Note:**

> [turrrrmbluuurrrr](ohjafeeljadefinitelyfeel.tumblr.com)
> 
>  
> 
> ETA [here's a short follow up to this on tumbls if you're into that](https://ohjafeeljadefinitelyfeel.tumblr.com/post/164238614737/pls-write-happy-ending-of-that-fic-im-dying-the)


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